I rolled my eyes at Caroline and said, “Yeah. I think she’s fine,” as Emerson chanted, “Five, four, one and two, all the rest are bad for you.”
“I will get you nonpoisonous water immediately,” I said sarcastically as we helped Emerson up and into the air-conditioning. I handled the lines while the boat idled, and we were off again.
It wasn’t until I went to go check on Emerson that I saw them. My heart almost stopped beating. Her cheekbone had a deep, dark bruise, and her arm was covered in what looked like a rash, but upon closer inspection was a cluster of tiny bruises.
“Oh my God, Emerson,” I said.
She shrugged. “You know I bruise really easily.”
Caroline took a couple of steps toward us and gasped. “Emerson, that is not normal.”
I agreed.
She bit her lip. “I haven’t felt great lately. Kind of dizzy, and I’m always exhausted. Just walking up the stairs makes my heart race.”
She pulled down the side of her bathing suit bottoms to reveal a huge red and purple bruise.
Back at the helm, Caroline said, “Look, the moment we get back to Peachtree Bluff, you’re going to the doctor.” She paused. “In fact, James and I have to go to the Hamptons for a benefit. Why don’t the two of you come with us, and we can get you to one of our doctor friends?”
Now my heart was racing for two reasons: There was no way—especially now—I could get on an airplane or face New York, neither of which I’d done since 9/11. And there was definitely something wrong with my little sister.
Emerson shook her head. “No, no. I don’t want Mom to know anything is going on. I’m sure it’s nothing. I’ll just run to a doctor in Peachtree.”
“And if it’s something more, I want you to be seen in New York,” Caroline said.
“Fine,” Emerson agreed, exhaling. She looked at us. “Promise me,” she said. “Not a word to Mom. She has enough on her plate.”
Caroline and I simultaneously put our three fingers up in scout’s honor.
I hated keeping secrets from my mother. But we had done it before. One more time probably wouldn’t hurt.
FOURTEEN
scary small person
ansley
“We made it,” I said to James over my car’s Bluetooth speaker, as I was pulling out of Linda’s driveway in Athens’s charming Five Points neighborhood.
“We sure did,” he said. These last few days had really brought out a different side of James. I was beginning to see him not as the slick, suit-wearing lawyer, but a family man capable of standing by my side when the chips were down—like when I was drowning in poop and finger paint.
Against all odds, I had even managed to put a presentation together for Jack. “You should know that Jack’s coming by the house at three.”
“So what you’re delicately telling me is to keep it clean?”
I laughed. “Exactly.”
It would have been more professional to have our meeting in my shop, but I wanted Jack to be in a home I had put my stamp on from top to bottom. And I knew it was childish, but after seeing him with Georgia a few nights earlier, I wanted him to remember what it was like for us to be more than client and decorator.
At three on the dot, Jack walked through the front door, Biscuit licking his bare ankles with gusto. I snapped my fingers at her. “Biscuit! Stop that!”
Jack laughed as he walked into the living room. I was sitting cross-legged on the floor surrounded by paint chips, wallpaper books, fabric swatches, and furniture catalogs.
“Wow,” he said. “This is not what the other decorators brought by to show me.”
“They aren’t as brilliant as I am,” I deadpanned.
He nodded. “Clearly.” He paused. “Are the girls having fun?”
